Illicit drugs were too easy to get at HMP & YOI Deerbolt, prison inspectors found. Almost 40% of random drug tests at the County Durham prison came back positive.
HM Inspectorate of Prisons published its report on Deerbolt in March 2025. Inspectors finished their fieldwork in December 2024. They found a prison with real potential that had made too little progress since their previous visit in 2021.
Deerbolt, near Barnard Castle, is a category C training prison for up to 474 adult men. A training prison exists to give men work, education and skills before release. It held 403 men during the inspection.
The Chief Inspector of Prisons, Charlie Taylor, said the findings remained disappointing. He said the prison needed to be clear about its core purpose and start training prisoners more effectively. On drugs, he wrote that “there needs to be a resourced, robust, and uncompromising push to confront the drug culture in the prison”.
How the prison was graded
Inspectors judge every prison against four healthy prison tests. These cover safety, respect, purposeful activity and preparation for release. Purposeful activity covers education, work and time out of cell.
Deerbolt scored not sufficiently good for safety and not sufficiently good for respect. It scored poor, the lowest grade, for purposeful activity. Preparation for release fared better, with a grade of reasonably good.
Three of the four grades matched those from 2021. Respect, however, had slipped from reasonably good. Inspectors described a noticeable deterioration in that area.
Ofsted, which inspects prison education alongside HMIP, judged overall effectiveness to be inadequate. That is its lowest assessment.
Inspectors raised 15 key concerns. They told leaders to treat five of them as priorities needing immediate attention.
Underpinning this, there needs to be a resourced, robust, and uncompromising push to confront the drug culture in the prison.
Charlie Taylor, HM Chief Inspector of Prisons
Drugs, violence and self-harm
The report described drugs as a substantial problem. Leaders had no coordinated or effective drug strategy. Local managers had not received funding for enhanced security at the gate.
Drug use also put pressure on health care. Inspectors linked a high number of medical emergencies to substance misuse. About 200 prisoners received support for substance misuse at the time.
Health services faced serious strain. There were too few health staff, and clinics often fell through. Staff did not always escort patients to appointments, including hospital visits outside the prison. Patients also received medicines late.
Violence had started to fall, but recorded incidents remained high compared with similar prisons. Staff used force, incapacitant sprays and special accommodation at relatively high rates. Oversight of these practices had improved but was not yet robust.
Self-harm ran at a very high rate. Some very troubled men received good support, but most did not get the same help. Inspectors said the case management system for prisoners at risk, known as ACCT, and the Listeners peer support scheme needed better use.
There were bright spots. A safety club offered a supportive place for men in crisis, with regular time out of cell. Inspectors listed it as one of four examples of notable positive practice.
Education, work and the daily regime
Inspectors reserved their strongest criticism for the daily routine. “The regime was sclerotic,” the report said. Restrictions on free movement made it hard for men to get around the prison.
Many men stayed locked up during the working day. Inspectors called this especially unacceptable for a category C training prison. Prisoners also struggled to reach health care or activities on time, or at all.
The curriculum for education, skills and work was too narrow for the population. It did not give men the knowledge and skills they needed for release. Attendance was low and men too often arrived late.
Much vocational teaching was weak, and leaders had not spotted the problem. Careers guidance was neither timely nor helpful enough. A useful set of enrichment activities ran on one wing but not on the rest.
Relationships between staff and prisoners on the wings were frequently poor. Inspectors blamed the restrictive regime, inexperienced officers and a lack of managers on the units. Frustration at the inconsistent regime and limited incentives was harming well-being.
Living conditions offered some relief. Accommodation, communal areas and the wider environment were reasonably good, and the prison was not overcrowded.
Leadership and what happens next
The governor had taken up post a year before the inspection. Many senior colleagues were also new to their roles. Inspectors said leaders understood the problems, but progress was slow.
A shortage of experienced officers remained a constant difficulty. Leaders regularly moved staff, including induction officers, gym staff and offender managers, to cover gaps. Many staff told inspectors they felt exhausted and frustrated.
Work on release planning and public protection proved more effective. Even so, men had too little contact with their prison offender manager, the officer responsible for their sentence plan. Pre-release support also fell short for the many men leaving Deerbolt.
Inspectors praised peer mentors who helped men restore contact with families. They also highlighted support from the charity Nepacs for prisoners with experience of care.
Deerbolt opened in 1973 on a former army camp and once held only young adults. The upper age limit ended in 2022. About a third of the men were still under 25.
The inspectorate carried out an independent review of progress at Deerbolt, published in November 2025. That follow-up visit assessed progress against the key concerns from this inspection.
About this story
This story is based on HM Inspectorate of Prisons’ report on HMP & YOI Deerbolt, published on 24 March 2025, following an inspection that ended in December 2024. All figures and judgements are the inspectorate’s. Read the full inspection report · See the prison’s profile in our directory.
